ARTICLES ABOUT ROBERT JOFFREY BY DATE - PAGE 3

The songs of the Supremes and Marvin Gaye fill the Joffrey Ballet's downtown studio as ballerinas in pointe shoes add a hip swivel or funky head bop to their pirouettes. Ballet and Motown may seem incongruous, but the merging of classical dance and contemporary music is the theme for the troupe's spring program. The dancers are rehearsing Donald Byrd's new "Motown Suite," receiving its world premiere at the Joffrey Ballet's engagement, titled "Cool Vibrations," Wednesday to May 7 at the Auditorium Theatre.

Dwight Eisenhower was in the White House, Marilyn Monroe wed Arthur Miller, and Jerry Lewis and Dean Martin performed together for the last time. And, on Oct. 2 of that same year, 1956, at the Frostburg Teachers College in Maryland, a troupe of six dancers, on tour in a borrowed station wagon, launched the Joffrey Ballet. One of them, Gerald Arpino, survives as co-founder and sole artistic director of the company in Chicago today. He and his troupe are now in the midst of celebrating next year's 50th anniversary, an astonishing accomplishment for any non-profit art, and particularly impressive in the uncertain world of dance.

In late 1972, Robert Joffrey approached a promising young dancer named Twyla Tharp and suggested she create a piece for his New York-based ballet company. Not one to mince words, Tharp answered bluntly. Essentially, as she recalls it, "I insulted him." "I don't go to your stuff," she told him. "I don't know what you do. I guess I could always do another 'Swan Lake.' " Unmiffed, the Joffrey Ballet's founder replied: "If I were you, I'd start with something smaller." He sent Tharp free tickets to his company's Delacorte Theatre engagement.

A quarter of a century ago, Gerald Arpino unveiled his "Celebration" at the Auditorium Theatre in honor of the Joffrey Ballet's 25th anniversary. Now the company is turning 50, "Celebration" is back for a rare revival and, like the Auditorium itself, we now think of this remarkable ballet troupe as our own. Ten years here have made them Chicagoans, and those of us lucky enough to catch most of their engagements can attest to the bountiful variety and magic stored in their repertory treasure trunk.

For adult ballet lovers, the perennial sprouting of "The Nutcracker" across stages every holiday season might induce a sugar headache. It tends to frolic in the same snow-dotted landscape of good cheer as Charles Dickens' "A Christmas Carol." And most dance companies--aware of the families who annually swarm to the Tchaikovsky classic-- consider it their cash cow. But the Joffrey Ballet's sumptuous production, which opened Wednesday at the Auditorium Theatre, remains a singular testament to the ballet's gracious storytelling and operatic virtuosity.

Dance enthusiasts, including fans of our own Joffrey Ballet, are abuzz these days about a legal dispute over an issue dear to the hearts of all artists. Who actually owns a choreographer's creation? The obvious answer -- the artist -- doesn't turn out to be an absolute, at least in the complex world of not-for-profit entities, which usually sponsor and finance a choreographer's work. During the summer, a closely watched legal battle over the rights to the late Martha Graham's works resulted in a New York federal district court decision ruling that Graham didn't own the rights but created her dances as an employee of the Martha Graham Center of Contemporary Dance.

"The Nutcracker," back in production at the Auditorium Theatre, is unquestionably about the past. Based on an early 19th Century tale, firelit by the holiday images of a Victorian yesteryear, the classic endures as a trip to earlier, even foregone traditions. Ah, but that is the abiding genius of Robert Joffrey's exquisite version, which took up permanent residency here after the Joffrey Ballet's relocation. Most U.S. "Nutcrackers" date from the '60s or so. This one, forged in 1987, enjoys some benefits from its relative newness.

The Joffrey Ballet of Chicago and the Auditorium Theatre have signed a four-year contract making the troupe the venue's resident dance company. The new arrangement means there will be three annual repertory engagements as well as "The Nutcracker" runs during each season through 2006-07. The Joffrey will be in residence at the auditorium for a minimum of 10 weeks each year. Beginning next season, the company will extend the three non-"Nutcracker" engagements from one to two weeks each fall, winter and spring.

Joffrey expansion: The Joffrey Ballet of Chicago is expanding its Auditorium Theatre programming next season to 10 weeks from 7, adding a week each to its three shorter repertory engagements. The company will offer a fall mounting of John Cranko's full-length "Romeo and Juliet" Oct. 8-19; the holiday run of "The Nutcracker" Dec. 5-28; a program of works by choreographer Frederick Ashton Feb. 11-22; and a bill of ballets by founders Robert Joffrey and Gerald Arpino May 5-16.

Rock bands such as The Doors don't conjure up images of ballerinas in tutus and pointe shoes -- unless, perhaps, in a psychedelic hallucination. But a four-part ballet, "Night Divides the Day," that is set to such Doors' hits as "Touch Me" and "Break on Through" opens Illinois Ballet's second "Rock Ballet 2003." This popular concert, which fuses ballet and pop music from the 1950s to today, even features large-scale stadium lighting as members of the Peoria-based Illinois Ballet dance to Shakira instead of "Swan Lake."